Social Media in the Newsroom Notes from BlogWorld08

During this session, my Internet connection was iffy, so I cataloged my tweets offline. You’ll find them here, along with moderator Jason Falls’ slides. Jason recapped the putting social media in the newsroom session on his blog, Social Media Explorer. Although I’m interested in this topic, I went to this session because I was also interested in hearing what all three panelists have to say about social media in the newsroom. I think you will be, too. Along with Jason, Jeremy Pepper and Daniel Honigman presented. Thanks to Sheila Scarborough for sending a tweet that inspired me to capture the notes.

Tweets that would have made it on Twitter – IF the connection was up. For the most part, the format is informal and tweet-like.

Will have to be an acceptable/education level to embrace @jasonfalls #bwe08

Have to give your audience a reason to use your tools, knowing your audience what your needs are

Have to listen to audience to know what they need and what they want to use

Listen = first rule of social media

Determine tools and build community

DJs do own MySpace outside of station

Columnist if they learned how to blog, they could make great bloggers and twitterers. Mike Royko was out meeting people. If you crack open your newspaper, you don’t know these people.

Twittering a three-year-old’s funeral, it wasn’t the tool that was wrong, but the editorial decision to do this was not a very good one.

In the rush to fox-if the news, no journalist value at all, social media whores.

No reasons to factor social media tools into that, it’s not about the tool or the channel, it’s an editorial decision @jasonfalls

We all have a responsibility to teach, the more educated the executives become the better off we all are. @jasonfalls

5 Cs of community development from Doe Anderson

Community, conversation, confidence, connection, curiosity from Doe Anderson

FastCompany – tried to do this years ago, reaching two different people: offline and online, they both make money, all good

Iammodern – magazine for upscale moms in dc, call for submissions, advertisers love it – are they struggling for content? No, went to 2 editions.

KPBS – fires in San Diego, did a mash up with google maps – membership up 60%, increase in donations

Vocalo.org – user-gernerate public radio in Chicago has producer tools

Up to each person to decide how much you want to be exploited @jspepper try to provide content that will best fit their leadership

Things to think about in the future, television wcnc in Charlotte, set up reporters with twitter during the election cover the governor, etc. Alan ?“Twitter can be and is in a sense like the police scanner for newsrooms.” Getting information from people on the street

Hsgametime.com – upload video of little Johnny’s game and may make it on the TV news

@coloneltribune – weren’t any touchpoints with the public via social media – built out a persona for him, old white guy surfing as the front man for social media. Tweets in a search voice. Wishes people a happy birthday on facebook. Was actually in top 100 on Digg for awhile. Wrote a post for pointer.com . . . what’s going at a building? Someone DMed the colonel, went to reporter and thanked them. Connects with a female audience via plurk, has tweetups, invites local bloggers and influencers to sit in on editorial meeting. A couple of people who are fans on twitter also subscribed to twitter.

Neighborsgo.com – citizen reporter at the Olympics

What can media outlets do?

– listen and decide tools

– approach community building strategically

– educate your audience on the toolset, will be a big pocket of people out there who don’t understand tools

– embrace their intelligence

Food for thought

– Embrace intelligence of audience – 90% of what you hear is from less than 10% of your audience and 10% of them are negative

– Should there be protection for citizen journalists?

– How do we separate and elevate paid staff content

– How do we prove the business model

– How do we change the advertising model – cpm and cpc are not going to work, VideoEgg cost per engagement, only bill you when someone pushes play

– Pinstorm.com in India – pay for performance, you only pay them when the site performs, will agree upon a rate for that metric

Know your audience, know them cold, know everything there is to know about them – Daniel

Jeremy blogs for three people, thanks for showing up

Jason Falls http://www.socialmediaexplorer.com

Daniel Honigman Tribune Interactive

Jeremy Pepper – http://www.pop-pr.blogspot.com

Update 09.28.08 Recovered tweets

Social Media in the Newsroom

the more respect and trust you earn, the more credible you are, has to fall into a logical standard path that makes sense @jasonfalls #bwe08

cincy inquirer tells reporters you need to connect w/people who care about what you write-better coverage #bwe08

we need to be establishing parameters and rule set for how we can operate/respect accuracy, integrity @jasonfalls #bwe08

not hard to pick up the phone & call to confirm b/c of social media what you write has a larger effect than a newspaper @jspepper, #bwe08

middle is taken out we need to teach old school journalists it’s not about tech, it’s about a communication mechanism @jasonfalls #bwe08

sheilas: @jayrosen_nyu Looks like @wiredprworks is live-tweeting #bwe08 panel on social media in the newsroom….

who is going to be the real journalist? need to help citizen journalism find its purpose @jasonfalls likes where it’s going #bwe08

successful bloggers know their audience cold, if you’re a newspaper chances are you don’t @dan360man #bwe08

journalists jumping ship into pr and teaching #bwe08

active in social bookmarking sites – submit your own stories to DIGG, twitter and retweet other stories #bwe08

triblocal.com @dan360man, could inspire people to write for you, make it easy for them to do it and build a community around it #bwe08

hyperlocal conference, for them it’s local issues that were the things that got them the most hits #bwe08

@jspepper worries about friends who are journalist, health insurance as wells as senior staff leaves- quality goes down #bwe08

in media panel seesion @jspepper, @jasonfalls, @dan360man sitting with @kristiewells #bwe08